There is nothing subtle about the Ultimate Fighting Championship. The UFC, as it is commonly known, is the promoter of mixed-martial-arts contests that feature competitors brutally attacking one another in a sport combining boxing, wrestling and kicking. Its in-your-face action has created legions of fans, especially in the San Joaquin Valley.

So it was not surprising that the head of the UFC would announce that the championship matches would resume later this month, even as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to force most Californians to remain sheltered at home and health officials are nowhere near declaring an end to the highly contagious disease.

What was surprising, however, was the location for the new bouts: the Tachi Palace Casino Resort in Lemoore.

Sources with knowledge about Tachi’s fight schedule said the resort will host UFC 249 on April 18.

At a time when all the major professional sports — the NBA, Major League Baseball, National Hockey League, Major League Soccer, and the groups that run golf and tennis — have suspended their seasons due to coronavirus, it is galling to learn UFC plans to put its fights on regardless.

To discover the bouts will be on land controlled by an American Indian tribe that is beyond state and federal control adds to the frustration.

The specter of the event, in the midst of a pandemic that has killed more than 12,000 Americans, is shameful.

Enough precautions?

UFC will stage the bouts without any fans in attendance. White told ESPN that those people who must attend the matches for them to be properly staged — the competitors, trainers and support personnel, UFC officials — will “be safer than anyone who is sitting at home in their house.” He promises doctors on site ready to help anyone needing it.

The combat can get fierce. Fighters engage skin on skin, sweating, breathing and, potentially, coughing. There is no social distancing in UFC bouts.

As for the location, the casino and resort are located on Tachi-Yokut tribal land near Lemoore in Kings County. As such, the property is outside the jurisdiction of both federal and state regulations. So while the casino and resort have been closed since March 20 as a precaution against spreading the disease, the tribe and its domain do not fall under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s sheltering-at-home order.

Ignoring key advice

The Association of Ringside Physicians has advised that all combat sporting events be put off while the pandemic is ongoing, regardless of how few participants might be involved. “Any combat sport taking place during this global pandemic places the athletes, officials and anyone else involved in the event under unnecessary risk of infection and transmission of COVID-19,” the association’s statement says.

Normally the California State Athletic Commission supplies ringside officials and physicians for title fights. But the commission has suspended combat sports through at least May. Yet because UFC 249 will be staged on tribal land, commission rules don’t apply.

Clear motivation

Neither UFC nor Tachi representatives would talk to Galaviz, so one is left to guess at the motivation to push matches at this particular moment.

But it’s not hard to guess: Money.

The Tachi fight night will be broadcast as pay-per-view, and as a live event when no other sports are occurring on television, it could be lucrative.

But staging it now, during the pandemic, sets a bad example, to say nothing of the certain risk to the participants. White can promise all he wants that everything inside the ring will be sanitized. But he can’t manage the travel for the contestants and their crews coming from around the country to the Valley. What if one of them picks up the virus en route?

White is gambling that he can bob and weave out of the way of an opponent that has been formidable. As of midday Wednesday, the federal Centers for Disease Control reported coronavirus had killed 12,754 Americans and infected 395,000 people.

Los Angeles Times sports columnist Dylan Hernandez noted Wednesday that combat sports have long pushed the edge of acceptability. He said that boxing has taken payments from murderous dictators in staging bouts overseas.

While White might not have the capacity of being shamed, holding UFC 249 at this moment in American history is just that: Shameful. He should immediately postpone the fight night, if for no other reason than to honor those who have died.

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